1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to electronic devices, and in particular, to cooling of electronic devices.
2. Description of Related Art
Referring to FIG. 1, an integrated circuit (IC) chip or die 10 (i.e., silicon die or chip) may be mounted in a wide array of IC packages in the prior art. For high-power processor chips, a heat sink 12, such as a copper heat sink, may be placed in contact with a chip 10 to remove heat from the chip 10. In some prior art designs, an integrated heat spreader (IHS) lid of the IC package (not shown) may be placed between the heat sink 12 and the chip 10 to facilitate cooling the chip 10. The IC package, and the heat sink 12 attached to the IC package, may be mounted to a printed circuit board (PCB) with or without the inclusion of a socket.
With current prior art practices, the chip 10 may be coupled to the heat sink 12 (or IHS lid if included) using thermal interface material 14, such as a polymer based thermal interface material or indium solder. Neither of these approaches may handle the increased thermal loads of future processor chips. It is projected that future processor chips may dissipate as much as 200 Watts of power.